The Ties of Friendship

Last Easter, I went back to my hometown for a good old catch-up, not just with my family, but with various friends. I rang one friend to arrange a coffee date. I would step off the bus and straight into a coffee shop for our chin wag. With another set of friends, I arranged a lunch to take place a couple of hours later, via our WhatsApp group.

Friendship: a commitment I freely choose.

I was to meet them on the Saturday, and both social arrangements had been made by the Tuesday. For some people, this would be the stuff of nightmares. ‘I hate to be tied,’ I hear such people say, as if an invite to have coffee at eleven on a Friday were a court summons. I have to say, this kind of talk saddens me, with its implication that friendship is a burden to be borne.

The Privileges of Friendship

I get a thrill when my phone pings with a message asking me to meet at eleven on a Friday, or with a reply that yes, my friend would love to meet me on a Friday. When I get a message like that, it tells me that someone is thinking of me, and that gives me a warm glow. I feel lucky that people think enough of me to want to make arrangements to meet me.

And I feel privileged to even have friends in the first place, because there are plenty of people who have none. Loneliness has become so endemic that the UK Government has appointed a Minister for Loneliness. We have never had more technology to communicate with, yet I wonder if this technology has turned us into tectonic plates, drifting further apart from each other.

Leaving Friendship to Chance

I could have left my arrangements to chance, turned up on the Saturday and sent messages to see who was around. Some people thrive on this. But I know that if I make concrete arrangements with my friends, they’re more likely to happen. Once I’ve made the arrangements, I can slot the rest of my schedule around them. For me, that’s freedom of a kind.

Yes, it’s a commitment. It means carving out time away from my work and family schedules. But it’s a commitment I freely choose to make. Rather than seeing the arrangements as an obligation, I see them as a beacon on the landscape, something warm and inviting to move towards. And I reap the reward for that effort in the form of laughter, support and a sense of belonging.